


Five Times Nobody Could Help Merlin and the One Time He Asked for Help

by sky_reid



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Blood, Cutting, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self Harm, just blanket warning for everything related to depression and self-harm, more like
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-23
Updated: 2014-01-23
Packaged: 2018-01-09 18:23:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1149308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sky_reid/pseuds/sky_reid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone knows Merlin needs help, but it's hard to help someone who doesn't want to be helped.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Times Nobody Could Help Merlin and the One Time He Asked for Help

**Author's Note:**

  * For [booksnchocolate](https://archiveofourown.org/users/booksnchocolate/gifts).



> i wrote u a thaaaaaaaang sarah but i didn't know what you liked so i wrote this and then i realized it was rly sad and triggery so i wrote you [another thing](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1149297) which is happier and all and it's totes okay if u skip reading this one kk
> 
> please please please heed the warnings this is a triggery story so only read if that doesn't bother you too terribly. i also want to add a blanket disclaimer over the way the characters act in this story which is, a) different people who self-harm act in different ways and their friends and family react in different ways and different things will help different people and i do not claim this story is the holy truth and b) i don't condone all actions of all characters in this story nor do i think every example in it should be followed nor do i claim that things that didn't work in this story wouldn't work for someone irl
> 
> okay now that's out of the way sorry about the long notes i just felt like i needed to add them given the sensitive nature of the subject
> 
> (having said all that i tried to end on an optimistic, yet realistic note)

 

_Five Times Nobody Could Help Merlin_

_and the One Time He Asked for Help_

 

i.

 

_it's nothing_

 

Merlin must have expected him to have left already, Gwaine realizes, because he freezes as soon as he is out of the bathroom. He's drying his hair with a small, fluffy towel, the white of it almost bright against Merlin's dark hair. The steam from the bathroom wrapping around Merlin's lean body is the only thing obscuring him from view, for once not a stitch on him. If Gwaine stretched his arm out from the bed, he could touch Merlin's thigh, if he lazily sat up, he could pull Merlin close. But he doesn't.

 

He watches as Merlin's arms quickly drop, as Merlin wraps the towel around his hips. It's just nonchalant enough that someone else might have missed the rush, it's just quick enough that Gwaine might not have noticed if he was just a little sleepier. As it is, he follows the droplets of water running down Merlin's thighs, the dark hairs of different length sticking to pale skin speckled with thin scars. He tilts his head up, rests his chin on his forearm and looks at Merlin's face.

 

“So that's why you never want to leave the lights on,” he says as he rolls over onto his back.

 

“It's nothing,” Merlin immediately replies, shrugs awkwardly and starts digging through his underwear drawer. He avoids meeting Gwaine's eyes and Gwaine doesn't push.

 

“Yeah, sure,” Gwaine says, but he knows, he's cleaned enough cuts on the arms of teenagers in dark clothes and heavy makeup, college students fighting to keep their scholarships, professional adults with not a hair out of place, who walk through his ER, smile and brush it off, say it's nothing. He's seen enough scars to know what they are. To know they won't stop appearing just like that.

 

“It's not what you think.”

 

“Whatever you say, Merlin,” Gwaine sighs. He rubs his palm over his beard, staring at the ceiling. The bed dips and one of Merlin's cold long-fingered hands ghosts over his bare stomach.

 

“It's nothing, I promise. A stupid thing I did when I was a kid.”

 

Gwaine grabs Merlin's wrist, brings Merlin's hand to his lips and kisses it. He doesn't mention that some of those scars can't be more than a few days old, because if Merlin can fool himself into thinking that Gwaine won't know he's lying, then he's definitely not ready to talk about it. He pulls Merlin close and kisses him, heedless of the drops of now cool water falling from Merlin's hair. Merlin smiles against his lips, his hands gentle on Gwaine's face. Gwaine grabs him and rolls them over, climbs on top of him and kisses him for all he's worth. It's nothing, he tells himself, and for now it's enough to forget that Merlin's skin is littered with scars, that they're both avoiding a problem that won't just go away.

 

ii.

 

_i'm okay_

 

Gwaine calls her sometimes. He talks about San Francisco, tells her about his new colleagues, mentions interesting emergencies, kids who tested magnetism by swallowing coins and future artists who poked themselves with their brushes and scissors. She talks about new recipes and the girl with blue hairbands who nibbles on a double chocolate chip cookie every morning while her mom drinks coffee, she tells him about the rain and the cold, mentions the new kitty figurines she bought. It's all light-hearted and superficial, the kind of talk she could have with any friend who lives far away and doesn't really keep in touch. He always asks in the end, how Merlin is doing. She doesn't know what to say, so she lies. She says he's better, he's doing fine. He goes out more now. He's gotten really close with Arthur. He doesn't cut anymore. It's not like Gwaine will know any better, he doesn't talk to Merlin anymore.

 

Gwen tries not to judge him. She knows it can't have been easy for Gwaine, living with Merlin for almost two years, trying, with varying degrees of failure, to help. But it's hard when she thinks about Merlin, alone in their apartment after Gwaine left saying it was for the best. It's hard when she herself feels guilty every time Gwaine brings it up, because really who is she to judge when all she does is let Merlin have his moments of weakness with no judgement (but no mentions of help or getting better either), so guilty she has to go over to Merlin's place and check on him. She doesn't say why she's there, but she thinks he's figured it out by now. She can't imagine how that makes him feel.

 

Still, as soon as she puts the phone down, she's standing up, grabbing her jacket and walking down the street. Merlin's door is unlocked, as it always is, she sometimes thinks he leaves it like that on purpose, hoping someone will walk in, try to rob him or attack him or kill him. She only knocks when the door is already open. There's no answer. “Merlin?” she calls out.

 

“I'm here,” comes Merlin's feeble reply from the kitchen. Then he adds, “I'm fine,” like he already knows what she's gonna ask. He probably does.

 

She finds him sitting at the kitchen table, a fresh bandage on his left forearm. He's picking at it curiously. He must have just put it on, because there's a red stain spreading on it. He pokes at it.

 

“Oh, Merlin,” she sighs as she sits next to him. She holds his hand in one of hers and runs her thumb over his skin. He looks at her, smiling.

 

“I'm okay,” he says, “I'm okay now.”

 

She wants to tell him, no, scream at him, that he is so far from okay, that this is so far from normal, but he's looking at her with this expression, like for a moment he's forgotten all the problems he's facing; he seems more _okay_ than she's seen him look in days. So she lets it go. Another time, she tells herself, she'll ask him to find help. Another time.

 

“Hey, I feel like baking. What do you think about muffins?” he asks and the enthusiasm sounds genuine.

 

“Yeah, muffins are fine,” she says.

 

iii.

 

_it's none of your business_

 

She lays out the assortment of razors and small penknives on the table. They weren't really that hard to find, not when one knows where to look. They're meticulously clean and sharp enough that she cuts herself just handling them. She watches the drops of blood well up on her finger, the contrast stark between the red of blood and the paleness of her skin. She presses her hand against her jeans and waits until the blood stops.

 

“Hey, sorry, there's a huge crowd at the Chinese place, I swear it's like they give out the food for free,” Merlin is rambling as soon as he's through the door, “so I went to that little Thai thing that just opened? I hope you don't mi—“ He stops as soon as he sees the assortment she's made on his kitchen table. She notices that he almost drops the plastic bags with takeout food containers, but he seems to remember he's holding them just in time. He places them carefully on the counter. She waits silently for him to turn to her; he doesn't. “What are you doing?” he asks quietly, an undercurrent of anger in his voice and she knows that feeling. She doesn't back down.

 

“I should be asking you that,” she says. The blades of the knives are cool under her fingers when she touches them.

 

Merlin leans against the counter, finally turning to her. He looks tired, maybe a bit too pale and a bit too skinny in his clothes in muted colours and only a size too big; if she saw him in the street, it would never occur to her that he was anything more than a stressed out postgraduate student. He's good at hiding it, she's gotta give him that, better than she ever was; if proof of the opposite weren't staring her right in the face, she'd probably never suspect there was anything seriously wrong in his life. She takes him in now, the elegant curve of his spine, the hard set of his shoulders, his arms crossed over his chest. The anger evident in the way he regards her.

 

“You had no right,” he says coldly.

 

For a moment she wonders if she's being too aggressive, but she can't let Merlin's tone deter her; Merlin _needs_ help, he needs someone to set him straight, even if that's not what he _wants_ right now. She's doing what is right, not what is easy, she's doing what someone should have done for her. Or so she tells herself.

 

To Merlin, she says, “You need help.”

 

“What I _need_ ,” he replies, his eyes narrowing, “is privacy. This is not your problem.”

 

“Merlin, you're my friend. I want to help you.”

 

Merlin's face forms an ugly mask when he points at the door. “Then leave,” he says. “It's none of your business.” It doesn't escape her notice that he won't look at the table. He won't even name what they're talking about, always _this_ and _it_.

 

She stands, glances at the door. She _could_ leave. Odds are Merlin would pretend nothing happened, everything would go back to normal. But that's not the point – she wants things to change, she wants to rattle him, _make_ him see the truth he refuses to acknowledge if she has to. She puts a hand on his shoulder. “Please, let me—“

 

Merlin doesn't let her get any further. He shrugs her hand off and hisses, “This is not about you, it has nothing to do with _you_. _I'm_ handling it. Get out.”

 

iv.

 

_it's not as bad as it looks_

 

The razor makes a quiet clinking sound as it slips from Merlin's bloody fingers and falls to the floor. Arthur steps into the bathroom and closes the door behind himself; there's no one else in the flat, no one to walk in or see, but leaving the door open somehow feels wrong, like the very air is invading some sort of a holy privacy. He leans against the door and stares at Merlin's face, his own, hopefully, carefully blank. He doesn't want his initial, reflexive, gut reactions that he can't stop – the anger, the disappointment, the disgust, the fear, the _pity_ – to show, doesn't want to spook Merlin into silence.

 

Merlin is looking up at him, his face pale with only splotches of red high on his tear-stained cheekbones. The colour of his eyes, clear and glassy, is even bluer in contrast. There's no fear in them, no regret (regret, Arthur knows, comes later, when the bleeding stops, when Merlin is in his arms, shaking, when he wants to do it _again_ ), only relief. When Merlin's hand follows the razor and falls to the cool tiles, smearing blood on them, Arthur's body sags and his knees give out; he lets himself slide down the wall and sits on the floor.

 

They're level now, but somehow that only makes Merlin seem even more vulnerable, with his legs bent and spread at an odd angle, like a broken porcelain doll's; his arms on either side of his body, almost like he needs them to support him sitting upright. A part of Arthur wants to reach out and touch him, make sure he's real and alive, that he won't fade into thin air, but his hands are shaking and when he buries his face in them, the image of Merlin doesn't go away. Neither does how sick he feels at it, so he stays on his side of the bathroom.

 

It's a while before he dares look up again. The contrast of dark blood on the white tile makes for a beautiful image. Arthur can't look at it for long. He clears his throat. “We should clean those,” he says, his voice quiet and a little hoarse. He wonders how many more times he's gonna have to say that, how many more times before Merlin stops or before Merlin dies. He used to wonder how much it would take for him to finally just give up and leave. Now he knows that he could never do that, no matter how hard it got.

 

Merlin looks at his left forearm, runs the fingers of his right hand over the cuts and smears the blood on his skin. It must hurt, Arthur thinks, but then, that's the point, right? Small droplets of blood continue to seep from the cuts on Merlin's arm and he wipes them off like it's the most normal thing in the world. For him, Arthur supposes, it is. Merlin looks at him with this dazed smile on his face, like he's a little high and Arthur wishes he hadn't seen that look before.

 

“It's okay, Arthur,” Merlin says. “I'm fine now.”

 

Arthur almost wants to laugh at how ridiculous that is because it's not okay, it's about as far from okay as possible in his book. The amount of blood he can see, the way Merlin's hands shake just slightly, it's scary.

 

Like he can read Arthur's mind, Merlin says, “It's not as bad as it looks. Promise.” Arthur snorts. He's not sure how to respond to that. Merlin crawls over what little space the bathroom allows between them and sits next to Arthur. He leans his head against the wall behind them and hold Arthur's hand. Arthur can feel the sticky blood that's drying on Merlin's skin. “It's fine, really.”

 

“No, it really isn't,” Arthur says, standing up and walking out. He wonders how many more scars he just gave Merlin.

 

v.

 

_i don't know what to do_

 

As someone who works with children Lancelot is used to keeping his cool in the face of extremely awkward questions, accidental crotch grabs, insane sugar highs and eating of inedible and potentially toxic objects. He's not used to being cool about being introduced to his girlfriend's ex and becoming friends with him. He's not used to spending a few nights of his and Gwen's every vacation at Merlin's flat either. And he's definitely not used to going to the kitchen for a glass of water and finding Merlin there changing bandages on his arm.

 

“Oh god, are you okay?” Lancelot asks, immediately approaching. He's had his fair share of accidents at the daycare so he knows his first aid; his first instinct is to help with whatever it is that happened to Merlin (he assumes a broken glass or a fall). When Merlin freezes at his proximity, Lancelot figures it's simply the surprise of someone else being there when Merlin clearly didn't expect it. He puts a hand on Merlin's shoulder. “What happened?”

 

“Um, no, nothing, I'm fine. Did you need something?” Merlin hastily tapes the bandage to his arm and rolls down his sleeves, but it's not fast enough and Lancelot sees the thin white scars running from Merlin's wrist down his forearm. He's not sure it's really his place to say anything, after all he hasn't known Merlin _that_ long, but he can't very well leave everything as is. In the end he asks Merlin to make him some tea so he can have more time to think about it. Merlin does so without complaint, smiling and even making conversation and Lancelot can't help wondering how Merlin got so good at faking being happy.

 

As soon as Merlin puts the mug down in front of him, Lancelot blurts, “I saw that, you know. The scars.”

 

Merlin waits a beat too long before answering. “I know. I was hoping you wouldn't bring it up.”

 

Lancelot looks up, surprised to find Merlin looking at him, like he's already resigned himself to having this conversation. The problem is, Lancelot himself doesn't have a lot of experience with things like this and he's not sure how these talks are supposed to go. He clears his throat before asking, “That bandage is not from an accident, is it?”

 

Merlin sits down next to him. He shrugs a little. “Not really.”

 

“Do you want me to check your arm?”

 

“Arthur has already.”

 

“Does he, um... Does he help you?” Merlin shrugs again. All Lancelot wants to do is hug him so that's what he does. “I don't know what to say,” he admits.

 

“That's okay,” Merlin replies. “I don't know what to _do._ I feel like that's probably worse.”

 

Lancelot just hugs him tighter.

 

i.

 

_i can't do this alone_

 

Merlin wishes holding a razor didn't feel as natural to him as it does. His hand shakes visibly when he throws the last one into the bin and even before it falls he wants to reach in and take it out. It's not a thought he's proud of, but he can't stop it.

 

“Not hiding anything, I hope,” Arthur says behind him.

 

“Cross my heart,” Merlin replies, turning around to face him. He scratches at his arm absently, pressing the scratchy fabric into the wounds that have barely healed. The pain is welcome. It also doesn't feel like enough.

 

Arthur steps closer, takes both of Merlin's hands into his own. “No going back?” he asks.

 

“Hopefully.” Merlin wishes he could give a more optimistic and certain answer, but he doesn't want to lie or give Arthur false hope. The truth seems to be enough for Arthur though. He pulls Merlin closer and hugs him. Merlin hides his face in Arthur's neck. “I can't do this alone,” he mumbles, the one thing he's sure of in this whole process.

 

“That's okay,” Arthur says. “I'll help you. We'll help you.” Merlin knows Arthur means it and he knows Arthur will stay with him as he tries to get his life together. He wonders if Arthur will stay when he fails. “I'm proud of you. You'll be okay.”

 

“I'll try,” Merlin promises.


End file.
